(Della Mae Graham) (1933)

Any copyrighted material on these pages is used in "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s)

This elegy was written by teen-age Della Mae Graham for her father who was president of the United Mineworkers' local [Local 4467] in Wilder. One Sunday morning Barney Graham was walking along the dirt road that was Wilder's main street, and as he passed the company store, two gun thugs shot and killed him. The community was so tightly controlled by the mine owners that no local preacher dared preach at the funeral of the dead union man; instead the oration was preached by divinity students from Nashville....
When Daddy [Don West] knew Della Mae Graham, she recited this poem and had written no tune.

The history of American labor is filled with pages of violence, blood-letting. murder and martyrs. Barney Graham was the organizer of the miners in the famous Davidson-Wilder strike of 1933. (See notes for ''My Children Are Seven In Number.'' ) At the height of the strike. the company imported a Chicago gun-thug who murdered Barney Graham in broad daylight on the streets of Wilder. The song was composed by Barney's daughter, Della Mae.